Wow! Really surprised they got it out this early and we dont have to wait till next week. Hope some of you hard core guys can get in there and give it a drive today to see how it fixed things while I'm stuck at work today! Really hope this patch works and makes this game the game it should be.

Really looking forward to the feedback on the new patch. Going to buy it today if it is positive,but frankly I'm not very optimistic at this point. Hopefully some of you fellas will have a chance to check it out soon.

I'm going to try a 10% race at Phoenix with 4x wear at lunch to see if they pit ever 7 or 8 laps again, and then at Charlotte to see how that cluster**** of a track drives in turns 3 and 4.

After all of this crap, they really should surprise us with "Hey, the Gen6 download has been modified--you can now use it in career mode!". That may sweeten my opinion on it a bit, but right now, I'm so very sour on this company and series.

Wiped my profile, started an entirely new save, and left controls at default with my Fanatec CSR Elite set to 900 rotation on S1 setting that I use for PC sims.

All I did was go into controls and drop FF to about 30% and dead zone to zero--it already had sensitivity raised to 75%. Went into a Hard race at Phoenix as Kasey Kahne, and took the pole with a 27:55 over Denny Hamlin's 27:57. Control felt surprisingly good without doing anything to it other than those 2 things.

I lean on Hamlin a bit in T1 and get the shot off of 2, and get a couple of tenths on him. I smoke the brakes hard getting into T1 on lap 2, and figure that's a bad idea so I start backing up my braking point. After 6 laps (37 laps on 10%), I've gapped Hamlin by about half a second. I'm killing him in turns 1 and 2, and he's eating me up in 3 and 4. By lap 8, he's back on my tail with a .1 gap. I hit my marks and keep him back between .1 and .3 until I catch lapped traffic on lap 13 (Josh Wise) on the back chute. I dive bomb him getting into 3, lean on him a bit and get past coming off of 4, but Denny is stuck behind him.

Now I'm curious if Denny can get by, because 3rd place caught him, and he was stuck up high behind Wise heading down the front stretch. He yards him coming off of 2 the next lap, and by then I've knocked down 2 more lappers--Nemechek and somebody else. The 11 has only dropped back to .8 at this point on lap 15, instead of 2.X+ seconds like I've seen in the past...and I'm AGGRESSIVELY knocking off lappers with reckless abandon.

Pit Stops begin as I'm coming back to the line to take lap 16. I get up to 1.58 seconds ahead of Denny, but I put Cassill and Gordon a lap down on 16, and Denny is only 1 second back now. I lost time with the lappers while he had a smooth section. Denny pits at the end of 16 in a 37 lap race.

I make it to my lap 19 pit strategy lap, and my chief tells me to come in. That's good, I was coming anyway. I see a caution in T3 as Nemecheck tries to blend coming off. Not good. That's what pissed me off before, but to be fair, there were about 4 cars near. I had a lapper come up near me as they came onto the track, but they dove back down instead of continuing up into my lane. I'll need to see more to make a judgment.

I pit under yellow, and since I was the last to come in, most of the field got their lap back when I pitted. But the field was all jumbled up, with backmarkers like Michael McDowell in the K-LOVE car running second. It was a good 2 laps before Kyle Busch got through the mess, and by then I was 8 seconds out front with 15 to go. I get up to 14 seconds ahead as the mess of a field continues, and another caution comes out on lap 30...again, it look like pitters merging.

I don't pit, because I'm a sitting duck. Everybody else does, and the 4 tires kill me on the restart at lap 32. Harvick goes by on the outside of 3 and 4, Tony Stewart follows his lead in 1 and 2, and I don't have enough grip to compete at this point. I run it in hot in T3 trying to slide job Stewart, and Kyle Busch sneaks under me in T4, and yards me down the front stretch. I chrome horn him deep into T1 to try to break him loose but he's stuck like glue. I at least maintain position and force Smoke to stay high and give up the spot. Burton and Truex are all over me in T4 but I beat them into 1, they go 2 wide, and let me get a little gap. Busch blows by Harvick with 2 to go. I push as hard as I can, but I can't do anything about those 2.

I scrape the wall in an attempt to get a run on the outside on 37, finishing 3rd.... .95 seconds behind the winner.

The caution from mergers is still troubling, as is the fact that the AI probably would have pitted twice in a possible 1-stop race, but that would be REALLY pushing it to the final lap on fuel, so I can cut them some slack there.

Going to test some more later tonight, as I ran out of time at lunch. The high points were control with my wheel--not once did I get that "wiggle" and tag a wall, or hit the brakes and dive right into a wall on corner entry. The AI respected my position more than I'm used to, as well.

Low points were the weird cautions still, and merging. It was only one race, but considering those were huge problems before, that's not a good sign.

I managed to run 10 laps at Charlotte before lunch, and let me say--that write up won't be pretty. Caution at lap 4 because they still can't drive the doglegs. Cars coming to a stop in T3, and coming off of 2. Caution again on lap 9...because the AI can't drive the doglegs.

Nothing changed there. So while the cars not pitting every 5 or 6 laps may be good, there are still massive, massive issues in some spots. I'm going to start a career to see how it goes. Maybe I'll put it in the careers forum.

I had instances where I noticed that would have happened in the past, where it didn't in my test. The car started to come down, but then instead had a massive "wiggle" mid-corner and jumped back up a lane. Like they realized I was there very late. Same thing from under me with a merger coming up...had it continued, I would have blasted him in the *** heading into 3, but he had the wiggle-shimmy-shake and jumped back down out of my way.

I had a couple spots where I was afraid the AI would slide up INTO me on the exit of 2 or 4--that's where I noticed it the worst in the past. I never got turned coming off of 4 at Phoenix, so that's good news. I didn't even get turned at Charlotte from that. I did slam into hilariously slow cars in 3 and coming off of 2, though.

I had a couple spots where I was afraid the AI would slide up INTO me on the exit of 2 or 4--that's where I noticed it the worst in the past. I never got turned coming off of 4 at Phoenix, so that's good news. I didn't even get turned at Charlotte from that. I did slam into hilariously slow cars in 3 and coming off of 2, though.

That was half the problem for me also. Glad to see that it looks like it has been adjusted for the better.

I had instances where I noticed that would have happened in the past, where it didn't in my test. The car started to come down, but then instead had a massive "wiggle" mid-corner and jumped back up a lane. Like they realized I was there very late. Same thing from under me with a merger coming up...had it continued, I would have blasted him in the *** heading into 3, but he had the wiggle-shimmy-shake and jumped back down out of my way.

I had a couple spots where I was afraid the AI would slide up INTO me on the exit of 2 or 4--that's where I noticed it the worst in the past. I never got turned coming off of 4 at Phoenix, so that's good news. I didn't even get turned at Charlotte from that. I did slam into hilariously slow cars in 3 and coming off of 2, though.

Hard is specifically designed to compete with default setups, so no matter what, they shouldn't come to a standstill using a default setup every lap.

Going lower wouldn't do a thing--it would just get worse. But to answer the question directly, yes...Champion does the exact same thing. You can draft down the backstretch and watch the entire inside line hit the brakes in between Turns 3 and 4. Same coming off of 2 if they don't get it right.

Hard is specifically designed to compete with default setups, so no matter what, they shouldn't come to a standstill using a default setup every lap.

Going lower wouldn't do a thing--it would just get worse. But to answer the question directly, yes...Champion does the exact same thing. You can draft down the backstretch and watch the entire inside line hit the brakes in between Turns 3 and 4. Same coming off of 2 if they don't get it right.

sorry, i thought as much, was just hoping, uggggggggh, trade in for me.

I played a race at Vegas today after the patch... AI was blowing by me on Hard, which to me is normal since I struggle at Vegas (which is why i picked it so I could race in the pack) The racing was very good I thought, other than the AI being overly aggressive, pretending I wasnt on the track running my line, they'd just plow into me regardless which of course... slowed me down, but not them. However... in the tri oval at the start finish line... the inside line would like almost slam the brakes and drop probably at least 15mph...

Just sad... really really sad...

I had a race afterwards at Michigan though. Very impressive. played with 4x wear... had some green flag stops with no issues. Good racing. So.. I just dont know what to think. some tracks its good, some... its just awful.

Some things never change apparently. I guess these guys are just always going to make games that visually look great, have a good foundation with tons of potential but... at the end of the day... they just dont play very well. They just cant fully deliver. So far what I've seen today from the latest patch... It's just still... still not all there. I dont get it..

Great foundation is right -- this game could be awesome. I still have fun with it because I'm a casual racer but I could see where it would drive some folks crazy. I kinda felt that way about Madden 12 -- I just couldn't get past all of the stuff that was wrong / broken. I don't know if these guys will get a 3rd chance to get it right -- I can't imagine they made a ton of money on this game. But on the other hand, it's getting better. Not sure if developing a new game on the PS4 / Xbox720 platforms will be easier or not for them. If a new one will get developed -- maybe expect it out at the end of 2014 (November -- to take advantage of holiday sales) and to prepare for the 2015 NASCAR season.

Quote:

Originally Posted by brandon27

I played a race at Vegas today after the patch... AI was blowing by me on Hard, which to me is normal since I struggle at Vegas (which is why i picked it so I could race in the pack) The racing was very good I thought, other than the AI being overly aggressive, pretending I wasnt on the track running my line, they'd just plow into me regardless which of course... slowed me down, but not them. However... in the tri oval at the start finish line... the inside line would like almost slam the brakes and drop probably at least 15mph...

Just sad... really really sad...

I had a race afterwards at Michigan though. Very impressive. played with 4x wear... had some green flag stops with no issues. Good racing. So.. I just dont know what to think. some tracks its good, some... its just awful.

Some things never change apparently. I guess these guys are just always going to make games that visually look great, have a good foundation with tons of potential but... at the end of the day... they just dont play very well. They just cant fully deliver. So far what I've seen today from the latest patch... It's just still... still not all there. I dont get it..

They're fine. I actually prefer an always connected experience.
I'd really prefer an offline way to play, but its not a bother.
I don't really like them, and am more reluctant to buy a game because of it.
I won't buy them. I want my games offline.